'Pope's hospital' put children at risk as it chased profits

[niyad]

'Pope's hospital' put children at risk as it chased profits

ROME (AP) — Doctors and nurses at the Vatican's showcase pediatric hospital were angry: Corners were being cut. Safety protocols were being ignored. And sick children were suffering. The Vatican's response was swift. A secret three-month Vatican-authorized investigation in early 2014 gathered testimony and documentation from dozens of current and former staff members and confirmed that the mission of "the pope's hospital" had been lost and was "today more aimed at profit than on caring for children."



(1 of 15) Pope Francis greets children from the Vatican's Bambino Gesu Pediatric Hospital. During the audience in the Vatican's Paul VI hall, Francis exhorted hospital caregivers not to fall prey to corruption, which he called the “greatest cancer” that can strike a hospital. “Bambino Gesu has had a history that hasn't always been good,” the pope said, jettisoning his prepared remarks to decry the temptation to “transform a good thing like a children's hospital into a business, and make a business where doctors become businessmen and nurses become businessmen, everyone's a businessman!”


What happened next surprised many involved: The report was never made public. While some of the recommendations were carried out, others were not. And the Vatican commissioned a second inquiry in 2015 that — after a three-day hospital visit — concluded nothing was amiss after all. An Associated Press investigation has found that Bambino Gesu (Baby Jesus) Pediatric Hospital, a cornerstone of Italy's health care system, did indeed shift its focus in ways big and small under its past administration. Under leadership that governed from 2008 to 2015, the hospital expanded services and tried to make a money-losing Vatican enterprise turn a profit — and children sometimes paid the price. Among the AP's findings: — Overcrowding and poor hygiene contributed to deadly infection, including one 21-month superbug outbreak in the cancer ward that killed eight children. — To save money, disposable equipment and other materials were at times used improperly, with a one-time order of cheap needles breaking when injected into tiny veins.

— Doctors were so pressured to maximize operating-room turnover that patients were sometimes brought out of anesthesia too quickly. Some of the issues — such as early awakening and the focus on profits — had been identified in 2014 by the Vatican-authorized task force of current and former hospital doctors, nurses, administrators and outsiders. The AP corroborated those findings through interviews with more than a dozen current and former Bambino Gesu employees, as well as patients, their families and health officials. The AP reviewed medical records, civil court rulings, hospital and Vatican emails, and five years of union complaints.


Bambino Gesu disputed the AP's findings and threatened legal action. It said the AP investigation was based on information that was "in some ways false, in other ways seriously unfounded and out of date by two years but above all clinically implausible and defamatory on a moral and ethical level." The hospital cited its reputation as a center of excellence. It draws top-notch surgeons to work there and celebrity visits, including one by U.S. First Lady Melania Trump in May. Bambino Gesu also pointed to the Vatican's second investigation, led by American Catholic health care expert Sister Carol Keehan, as evidence that the allegations were false. "While there are many things we could have missed or been misled about, we came away from this evaluation with a real sense that on the major charges and the major issues alleged, we have been able to disprove them," Keehan's report said.

Facts are hard to come by in the secretive halls of Bambino Gesu, which does not make public financial details or its mortality and infection rates. Perched on a Roman hillside just up the road from Vatican City, the private hospital sits on Holy See territory and enjoys the same extraterritorial status as a foreign embassy — making the Italian taxpayer-funded institution immune to the surprise inspections other Italian hospitals undergo. It is financed by Italy's public health system, but its main campus isn't even technically in Italy.

. . . . .

https://www.mail.com/int/scitech/health/5327222-popes-hospital-children-risk-chased-profits.html#.1272-stage-hero1-1